BlackBerry’s market share in Canada continued on a downward path in January, though buzz about its new Z10 phones helped to draw some Canadians’ attention back to the struggling brand, a new poll from Ipsos-Reid finds. (Canadian Press photo) | CP

BlackBerry’s market share in Canada continued on a downward path in January, though buzz about its new Z10 phones helped to draw some Canadians’ attention back to the struggling brand, a new poll from Ipsos-Reid finds.

BlackBerry had 23 per cent of Canada’s smartphone market in January of 2013, according to the poll, tying the brand for second place with Samsung.

The most popular brand in the survey was Apple’s iPhone, which has seen its market share grow steadily to 32 per cent.

Just two years ago, BlackBerry was on top in Canada, controlling 41 per cent of the smartphone market. The iPhone had 23 per cent of the market at the time.

But the more impressive story may belong to Samsung, which has seen the popularity of its Galaxy and Nexus phone lines grow from a mere nine per cent of the market in January of 2011 to its current 23 per cent.

One bright spot for BlackBerry in the data is in consumers’ plans for future smartphones. Thirty-four per cent of respondents said they were considering buying a BlackBerry, up from 29 per cent last August.

BlackBerry’s market share numbers may have been hurt by consumers holding off on buying new phones as they awaited the release of the BlackBerry Z10, which was unveiled at the end of January.

With the phone on sale in Canada for just a few weeks at this point, there is no data yet on sales. But according to Google Trends research carried out by the tech blog BGR.com, interest in BlackBerry has been strong recently in the regional markets where the brand has stayed strong — Canada, India, Indonesia, and South Africa, among others — but interest generally across the world hasn’t materialized.